


Six Degrees Of Separation

by BroodyJC



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, also pain?, the scenes that went missing on S3??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-10-06 04:35:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17338706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BroodyJC/pseuds/BroodyJC
Summary: First, you think the worst is a broken heartWhat's gonna kill you is the second partAnd the third, is when your world splits down the middleAnd fourth, you're gonna think that you fixed yourselfFifth, you see them out with someone elseAnd the sixth, is when you admit that you may have fucked up a littleOrAlex and Maggie break up, but Sam is there when she still needs to heal on her own





	Six Degrees Of Separation

**First, You Think The Worst Is The Broken Heart**

_Liberosis._

_The desire to care less about things._

**

Alex was used to pain and its multiple facets. Physical, mental, emotional. It doesn’t mean it hurts any less when it happens again, and again, and again. It doesn’t mean that she doesn’t lose her breath, that her eyes don’t burn, that her heart doesn’t clench in her chest as if anchoring itself to whatever it can grab to prevent itself from leaving for good.

To stop caring. To stop hurting.

It would be too easy. Too easy makes no sense in the real world. Too easy is not a reality.

So, it hurts. More and more each passing time. Or, maybe, it hurts less and she just couldn’t compare each loss, each moment. They all have taken their fair share from Alex, from her kindness, from her happiness, from herself.

Losing her father came first. Perhaps, the loss itself wasn’t what hurt most, maybe it wasn’t the realization that her family was smaller then. Perhaps, the most painful memory was having to stare at her mother’s eyes, and listen to the words delivered by someone who was supposed to protect her from everything, from someone who should never be the one to inflict pain.

But it had come from Eliza. And her father never came back.

Until a year ago, Alex had hoped her father would someday come through the front door, first from her mother’s house, then from the dorm she had shared through all the years she spentat college, then from her apartment. None of that happened. Logically, Alex knew it would never happen. But it did. And Alex wished it hadn’t.

The pain was bigger than she had imagined. It was more than she could handle. And it became just another one of those things she compartmentalized, something she knew she someday would have to deal with but, at the moment, wasn’t so important. Until it came a day where it just wasn’t all that important anymore. Like that, it was forgotten.

(Maybe, if she didn’t cope like this, her love life would’ve been way easier.)

Of course, becoming an agent was next. Pain became familiar, a feeling she never thought she could handle became a constant to look forward to everyday. Physical pain meant nothing, physical pain was momentary, a winter breeze that pierced through her skin to go away seconds later.

Alex would take physical pain over any other without a second of hesitation.

Seeing her sister get hurt stirred something inside her she never thought she would feel. It left a bad taste in her mouth, a sinking feeling in her stomach, her limbs aching to do anything, everything to keep Kara away. To keep Kara _sa_ _fe_. It was instinct, to protect a loved one, to be able to take all their pain and pour into oneself.

She could only watch. And hope. Growing frustration deep inside her, clenched fists and tears she refused to acknowledge. Pain built from frustration was, by far, the worse. Nothing could compare to the inability to not be able to help, to protect.

Heartbreak was introduced to her shortly after.

Because heartbreak came in form of dazzlingly smile and defined dimples. It came in form of shared laughter, light banter, late nights, passion, love. _Love_.

Heartbreak came in form of Maggie Sawyer and beautiful, pleading eyes, charm exhaling from every gesture, every word.

Alex lost herself. There was no other definition to explain what had happened. Alex had taken her heart out and handed it willingly, no matter the consequences. As Maggie took it, in trembling hands and hesitant grasp, Alex believed her, believed them, believed it could work.

Heartbreak hurt so much because she was left with her heart back in her hands, a heart that had been under someone else’s care, someone who would look after it, but the heartbreak came with an explanation. Their care was not the same, the way they cared wasn’t enough, it wasn’t the same energy Alex had put into it, and that was were the pain laid. That was the source of a heartbreak.

Her heart was given back to her, a little rough on the edges, a little darker, less vivid, less open.

(A little broken.

A lot broken.)

Alex had thought, Alex was sure, that after so much pain she went through, this time would be just like it.

Was she wrong.

Because she had a piece of herself back but not like the shape it had when it left. It was fitting a ball into a cube-shaped box. Some part of Alex was lost, a part she had given to someone else, in hope they would keep it and care for it.

Because Alex could have her heart back, but it didn’t mean she had herself back. From getting a piece of herself from the past, it didn’t mean she, herself, would go back to that place. It took time. Adjustment. _Pain_.

So much pain.

Heartbreaks were the worse.

Maggie, big, brown eyes stares at her apologetically, eyes saying the words her mind though but her mouth wouldn’t produce, both their hands closed around the confirmation of the end.

(Alex’s heart.)

As Maggie leaves, Alex has to keep standing, arm stretched out, small piece of metal burning in her hand and a big hole on her chest aching to get what it had relinquished so many months ago.

_See you around, Danvers_.

She wishes she cared less about thing, so maybe, just maybe, the ache on her chest would be a little weaker, that her heart would heal faster. It didn’t worked that way. Alex cared, too much for her own good.

(Alex finds out the hole where her heart used to beat could be filled by cheap alcohol as her heart healed on the outside, shaping itself back into the form it had before, to be able to go back and complete Alex once more.

Healthy coping was never one of her best skills.)

 

**What’s Gonna Kill You Is The Second Part**

_Énouement._

_The bittersweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turn out, but not being able to tell your past self._

**

“You okay?”

_At what level?_

There is a fairly high number of ways she could answer it in the end, the question just wide-ranging enough to enable a variety to the deepness of the response. The intonation of the question, the delicacy of how it’s delivered, the deep care laced through every syllable.

The numerous ways she could, she should, she was expected to, answer tied intimately to how it was delivered.

_You okay?_

Most of the times, she would lie. Compartmentalize, store it away so she could deal with her feelings some other time, until some other time never came. It was what was expected, after all.

It was how adult interaction went anyways. No one cared enough to listen, to really listen, even when all they got was a lie. The question and, subsequently, all of its variations were something we were trained from the very beginning to share the words the other person was expecting to hear.

Never the truth. The truth was painful, the truth brought obstacles, the truth was a break from the norm. No one wanted that.

And lying was easy, because they never cared enough to press. Like that, no matter how many times a day she heard it, it never bothered. Not in the slightest. Because she wasn’t expected to share the beautifully harsh truth.

_You okay?_

And maybe, there was a possibility there would be a crack in her willpower, when the question would come too early and she hadn’t had a chance to put her feelings away yet.

In a moment of inattention, her mouth would betray her brain, her tongue curling around a single word that would bring worry, pity, to someone’s eyes and it wouldn’t matter how genuine the emotion was, it would be there and she would need a way to cover it up.

Over the years, she had mastered the tight smiles, just convincing enough to make even the most stubborn ones drop whatever it was. Over the years, Alex became good in showing nothing but what she wanted other people to see, all of the potential cracks being reinforced.

So far, it had gotten her really far, avoiding conversations she wasn’t ready for yet and, most likely, wouldn’t be ready for a very long time.

_You okay?_

And, perhaps, it was how soft the voice sounded, how open brown eyes were as if they saw her, as if they cared in the middle of all the confusion and madness that surrounded them they had the time to settle into Alex, realized she hadn’t been her usual self and cared enough to ask about it.

It was something Alex couldn’t quite place her head around.

Call it a motherly instinct, developed once she was supposed to understand and predict every need of a completely dependable human being.

Call it a Sam Arias thing, a person Alex could not have shared more than twenty words with and yet went out of her way to make sure things were alright. Genuine care. What a foreign concept.

Call it a blurry vision, an aching chest, half a bottle of scotch poured into her glass through the night, a numb, constant feeling settling deep in her bones, her need to let go of some things before they consumed her.

Taking the rest of her drink in one go, her eyes settle on Sam (more like, Sam’s general direction), light brown hair falling in waves around her shoulders, arms wrapped around her torso, fingers tucked inside the sleeves of her sweater.

She laughs and it’s bitter, it’s low, it makes the worry grow right in front of her. Sam approaches, head tilted to the side and eyes following Alex’s drunken movements, how her hand comes up to rub at her eyes, until it settles at the back of her neck.

Alex never thought she could break. But the burning in her eyes were proof enough all it took was a little caring, a little effort. _A little Sam_.

“Maggie stopped by at the apartment today.”

_The_ apartment, not _mine_. Impersonal. Trying to detach herself from the event. As if, sharing it with Maggie once, making it _theirs_ for a while had ended every possibility of it becoming _hers_ again someday.

And she thinks she already shared too much, because apart from saying things were over, she never got into much detail. There was no need for such thing. Because if it was over what good would it do to go over and over something that would only hurt her in the end?

_Compartmentalize._

Or, maybe, not saying anything was what kept her together for so long and, that, she didn’t want to change. Problem is, sometimes feelings were gathered for so long all it takes is a feather to make it spill.

Maggie leaving, Maggie coming back, Maggie so close to her but not _hers_ was not a feather. It was a brick wall. And Alex, god, Alex was so close already to spilling that, when it came, it broke her completely.

Later, Alex would blame everything that happened on her inability of keeping her mouth shut. The idealistic idea of opening up to a complete stranger, to shout your problems to a face she would never see again, to someone who she wasn’t close to, to someone who wasn’t supposed to care. The glasses and more glasses of scotch, making her tongue loose, and her filter wider. The need to let it all out, so she could find more space to bottle everything up again.

(The need to be validated, the need to share, the need to be vulnerable after being the strong one for years to end.)

“She still had some things back there and she just showed up, you know? She called, said she was in town for the job and asked, I didn’t know how to say no. And she was just trying to act like we were in the beginning, as friends, like she didn’t break my heart, it was all too much. Seeing her leave again… no one tells you how it hurts more than the first time.”

Alex doesn’t know when Sam got so close to her, how her warmth moves through the small space shared between them, enveloping Alex in an atmosphere she isn’t actually sure she knows how to breath. She finds she doesn’t mind. It’s hard not to feel safe, not to feel like she can be vulnerable when there’s something so comforting next to her, inciting her to let go, to continue, to share. Because she is going to be there to keep her from hurting further.

“When I met her, I knew she was going to” Sam’s hand lurches forward, wrapping ever so gently around her forearm, the same one which its hand is holding the empty glass, and it is probably the longest Alex went without drinking for the past two months. “she was… everything. Am I bad for wishing I could tell my old self how it turns out? So I could do things differently, to hurt less?”

“No, it makes you human, but we have to accept that there are things we cannot prevent.” Her free hand comes up, thumb brushing against her cheek, retracting the tear Alex refused to acknowledge, and Sam smiles. It’s the first smile she has ever seen on her face and, even if it’s a sad, knowing one, it’s beautiful. Like her. “But I also think that once it happens and it’s over, we have to take our time to understand that they weren’t our book. Just a few chapters.”

The intensity of her gaze makes Alex’s head spin and she has to ground herself to the place they are. The small balcony of Kara’s apartment. Her eyes set into the floor, refusing to look up. Because she doesn’t feel creaks anymore, she feels holes spouting whatever it was inside for so long. It’s scary. It’s the scariest.

There’s a loud crash from somewhere inside the apartment, followed by laughter mixed with concerned words. Sam whips her head around to the source of the noise, her hand leaves its place against Alex’s arm and cheek, the contact being missed the moment it’s gone, and whatever bubble they inserted themselves into is over.

Fragile like that.

Sam only throws Alex one apologetic smile before going back inside, leaving her to watch her retracting form with a burning sensation in her face, one that Alex’s tries and tries to convince herself was not because of a tender hand.

“Fuck.” Alex mutters to the empty balcony, cold air blowing against her face.

She wants another drink.

 

**And The Third, Is When Your World Splits Down The Middle**

_Kenopsia._

_The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet._

**

On some rare times, Alex wished to have Kara’s invulnerability. The way her muscles ached after training was not something she wanted to give up on any time soon, but she envies her sister on some instances.

She too would like to punch holes through concrete blocks when she was frustrated, or fucking pissed, which was an emotion she’s been feeling a lot lately. Self control, in that moments, was not something she actually had, a notion that went against everything she had ever learned.

Rationally she knew it was nothing but an aggravation of a feeling, but pissed was too light for what she felt, so it needed more. There were no words to put what she felt in, she could only feel and never be able to explain, to rationalize and move on, not that she ever wanted. Because she was finding out that being pissed, being angry, was an easier way to deal with the world, to deal with her emotions.

Fucking pissed, and it only hurt her physically, the lack of self control growing and the rage threatening to combust.

Alex stares at her recently bruised knuckles, the wounds still fresh and red, open. Bleeding. She doesn’t feel them now, but she knows, even with all the alcohol running through her veins, that it’s only a matter of time. Tomorrow. It is going to be a bitch. Tomorrow, as of today, she is going to wish she had Kara’s invulnerability, so she could physically do what her emotions couldn’t. Like punch a wall at two in the morning, drunker than she’s ever been.

She brings the bottle of whiskey to her lips only to realize it is empty, for how long she doesn’t know, maybe for as long as she’s been sitting at her couch, ever since she got hurt in a desperate act of frustration.

A little spill. Of anger and pent up rage.

Another little spill, and the bottle is thrown across the living room, crashing against the wall into an infinity of smaller pieces. What a poetic way of representing her heart in the real world.

Empty. An insult of an inanimate object that represented the place she lived in right now. Or the place she spent her nights in, because even though less than half of the things were taken away, all the life went with it.

Because there was only one toothbrush at the sink, because the small couch felt too big, because the wardrobe had more than enough space for her clothes, because there were only three framed pictures instead of five.

Because Maggie left and the place that was nothing but life, died. And Alex was left to pretend the world around her, the world she lived in, wasn’t burning to the ground, in a place full of memories of _them_ and not enough memories of _her_.

Because Maggie left, and Alex was still there, in the middle of the flames, trying to find a way to extinguish them, as well as rebuilt her broken heart and move on. And Alex was alone with the ghosts that haunted her at any time of the day, trying to learn how to deal with the shadow of happiness breathing down her neck.

Learning how to live alone in the world she built for two.

She gets up to grab another drink.

 

**And Fourth, You’re Gonna Think That You Fixed Yourself**

_Opia._

_The ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable._

**

“Please, tell me I didn’t read this wrong.”

Alex takes more than she would ever admit to anyone to gather her thoughts. There are so many thing she could focus on instead of talking, and her brain has decided to do just so.

Rhythmical breathing hitting her flushed cheek, goosebumps erupting through the length of her arms because of it, the sound of her heavy breathing, her blood pumping through her veins so loudly she felt it in her ears.

Lips tingling, as if every nerve ending trembled from the reminder of what just happened, as if they had a mind of their own and knew what they wanted to do, what they had to do, what they craved to do.

Warmth coursing through her skin, heating every inch of her body, a warmth she had forgotten what felt like. Something so good she felt for the first time in months, being the cause of shaking hands and unsteady breathing.

She opens her eyes and stares, jaw dropping barely an inch, eyes locked, Sam’s fingers tangled in the hair at the top of her neck. She doesn’t know how they ended here, she doesn’t care that much right now. Because every cell of her body screams for her to spring into action, to stop being rational, to give herself once more. Her stunning is stronger, her cells begging for something her atoms could not comply.

“Otherwise this is going to be really awkward.”

Alex just stares, thinks of all the things that led them to this moment.

(An earthshaking kiss that stole Alex’s rational thinking and threatened to shred the thin layer of protection she managed to weave above the hole where her heart used to lie.)

Inconclusive tests, two or three shared glasses of whiskey, most likely not more than four, at Sam’s house, the absence of Ruby fully noted, an afternoon wasted on finding out what they already knew: there was nothing wrong with Sam. Not physically, at least.

Despair, perhaps, of not knowing what was happening, not the full lengths of it, anyways, and the need to be in control of at least one thing in their lives. Desperation from the missing hours, the ineptitude of making the events come back to life in her mind, the absolute despair of having to make one aspect of her life to appear normal, for pretense only.

Neediness. For human touch. To feel something other than pain and worry and sadness. To forget. To have something easy that wouldn’t hurt her when it eventually ended, like most things.

Starving. Emotionally and physically. Mentally.

“You didn’t.” Words come easily once she looks at Sam, her hands come up to grasp at her hips, trying to bring her closer, to flush their bodies together in confirmation that this wouldn’t slip through her fingers. “It’s just-”

“I know.” Yet, she doesn’t let go, she doesn’t try to put distance between them. Yet, Sam looks at her like she has all the answers even when both of them know otherwise, that things aren’t that simple. Yet, Sam pleads. “And I’m not asking something of you.”

“Because of what’s happening now, and there’s Ruby and...”

But Alex slides her hands up, to a slim waist until they stopped just shy of the side of Sam’s breasts, eyes trained on any response she managed to elicit. Blown wide pupils, change in breathing, dropping eyes to a line of sight dangerously close to the one that contained her mouth.

“You’re still healing and we don’t want you to start something to be an emotional crutch. I just thought that, maybe, if we acknowledge the fact that there’s something here, it wouldn’t hold too much power over us.”

“Now that we’ve done that” Alex’s right hand find Sam’s cheek, fingers easing a strand of hair to be held behind her ear, a beautiful blush coloring its tip “fuck it.”

It’s the easiest decision she made in the entire year.

Because the feeling of Sam’s lips against hers lights a fire behind her eyelids she was afraid she would never experience again. Because it should be frightening, how open she apparently was to the potential of getting hurt, or maybe at the prospect of feeling without all the undertones that came with it.

Convincing herself to urge Sam up, longs legs wrapping tightly around her middle, frantic whimpers leaving to wrap themselves around the minimal space between their bodies, is easier than she ever imagined.

Taking Sam then and there, hard, fast and messy against the wall two feet away from Sam’s front door, slickness covering her fingers, hands desperately grasping at her neck as hips ground down to find Alex’s fingers at every thrust, raspy moans spurring Alex to go deeper, harder, until Sam breaks.

What a lovely sight it is.

Sam’s head thrown back, a thin layer of sweat covering her forehead and the skin displayed by her cleavage, mouth open letting out a sound that would haunt Alex for the rest of her days, hair disheveled, neck exposed, pleading to be touched, kissed, _marked_.

So much skin yet to unravel, clothes still standing in the way of the one thing Alex craved the most.

( _Intimacy_.)

“Alex.”

It’s soft, breathless, a hushed affection against her ear, and her hands untangle from where they were place so firmly, easing its grip to a caress, resting, finally, against her shoulder. They kiss, slower, softer, much like their first, and it doesn’t take much for Alex to start moving again.

Sam whispers the directions to her, hands too busy working on discarding any article of clothing she managed to land them on, and Sam is thrown into her mattress wearing nothing but an unbuttoned pair of tight black jeans.

Vulnerable. Such an exquisite concept.

Vulnerable. The one thing you are taught from the very beginning to not be, or the world will eat you alive.

Vulnerable. And people cannot know what makes you weak or they will use it against you.

Yet, she is met with vulnerability in brown eyes, one thing she should never look for. It feels like invading on something she was never allowed to in the first place. Privacy. Personal space. The past.

But Sam urges her forward, working on both their jeans, eyes never leaving each others. Feels wrong then, not to look, not to trust. To deny herself from it feels way wronger than the duality of her own personal struggle over all the implications of it.

Alex lowers herself on top of Sam, their bodies fit together in a way Alex stores in the back of her mind, something to analyze later ( _later_ ), something to freak out about later. Sam opens up to her, and it doesn’t feel like a one time thing.

Doesn’t feel like relieving pent up stress. Doesn’t feel like nothing.

Feels like a promise, feels like moving on, feels like being whole. ( _Compartmentalize_.)

Nails dig at the skin of her back, the hand that wasn’t preoccupied by marking her rests gently against her cheek and it’s enough to make the pace of her wrist falter. They look at each other and she slows down, down, down. Foreheads touch each other’s, breath mingling in their need to not break whatever was happening.

Vulnerable. Such an exquisite concept. Yet, here Alex was, letting Sam see her, no layers covering her, choosing to be seen. Giving herself the possibility of being hurt again.

Sam wraps her arms around her neck, pulls her down and the charged electricity they shared is still there, it just doesn’t feel as heavy once the gaze is broken. Alex findshaven by resting her forehead against Sam’s shoulders and she listens.

Sam is a masterpiece.

She commits every sound, from the tiniest of whimpers to the longest drawn-out moans, to memory. Sam comes (beautifully, magnificently, perfectly), arching her back out of the bed, dragging Alex up with her, sheets wrapped in a death grip, the plane of her stomach too stunning not to be kissed.

The second orgasm is longer, not, in the slightest, less mind-blowing, if anything, is way more. The second orgasm seems like a series of smaller, less intense ones, bundled together in what feels like hours passing.

“Hey there.” She says softly, brings a hand up to brush Sam’s hair out of her face.

“Don’t look so smug.”

But it’s easier said than done, Sam’s voice cracks at every word, it’s deeper, weaker, as if it was produced by more effort than she would admit.

“I could always go again until you let me be as smug as I want about it.”

Sam laughs lowly, a breath of hair leaving her lungs, much alike so many others Alex had seen so many times already. But this one settles against the pit of her stomach and she is reminded of what happened. The intensity. The vulnerability.

( _Intimacy_.)

Alex kisses her again.

 

**Fifth, You See Them Out With Someone Else**

_Sonder._

_The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as yours._

**

Reign has gone rogue.

Sam has gone rogue.

It confusing, but it takes her two minutes to understand that it’s not. Because it’s Kara and Supergirl all over again, two different personalities, with their mannerisms, their own agendas sharing one living body. One living indestructible body.

Except that Sam cannot control it and Reign is evil and learning to take over for longer each time. Apparently, Reign took over for good.

It’s been two days, two whole days since Sam came back and it’s the longest she’s gone through, the worry digging its way into her chest until there was no other place for it to plant its roots. Her worry was cursing through her veins, it was Sam, it was Sam out there, getting hurt, blaming herself for what was happening. Sam, caring, beautiful, breathtakingly kind Sam. And there was nothing Alex could do.

She stands high at the DEO, arms crossed in front of her chest to keep her hands away from running through her hair, jaw clenched to prevent her teeth from biting her lip, eyes unfocused to prevent herself from crying.

It’s _Sam_ and it hurts more than it should.

Alex was used to pain, that was something she could handle. That’s the thing. She could handle the pain. She couldn’t handle the people that she loved ( _Sam? Sam._ ) being hurt.

(The scars of her heartbreak were still too fresh and too recent, but she had gone through it, she had made it. Not in the healthiest of ways but it was over now, no need to mull over it.)

She wishes she was the one out there, because she could deal with the pain, she could handle the harmful thoughts, she could deal with whatever consequences of being Reign caused her. What she couldn’t do was stand back and wait for things to unfold.

It felt like watching her sister all over again, waiting and waiting, hoping she would be okay no matter what.

Right now, on top of Kara, invulnerable Kara, finding someone stronger, faster, dirtier, and still flying face first into danger to protect, she still had to worry for Sam. She couldn’t pick a side, because she couldn’t lose any of them.

“Alex!”

The tone is rushed, the timber of the voice one that she hasn’t thought she would hear again so close to her, unless through a phone. Before she can second guess her gut, she raises her hand, stopping the agents running behind Maggie, her eyes taking her in.

She hasn’t changed, Alex doubts she can. There would always be a warmth associated with Maggie, it was in the way she looked at her, trusting eyes and crooked smile, begging Alex to open up.

The shock leaves as fast as it comes, she has more important things to worry about, even if things are brought to the surface with Maggie back, emotions she worked so hard on pushing down clawing back, ripping apart the sensitive, thin skin covering her wounds, making her bleed.

Funny thing, once you reopen it, it bleeds less. It hurts less. Because if the surface is sealed, it meas that some part deep in the flesh has healed, and once opened again, that part doesn’t bleed. Only what’s above.

Feels like it right now.

It bleeds, it hurts, but it’s not the same. Alex can breath, Alex can look at Maggie and not ache for contact, not beg for attention and love, she’s past that. She’s healing.

“Maggie.”

“I heard about Reign.”

“So you rushed all the way from Gotham to help?” Eyebrow raised, amusement on her eyes, small smile on her lips. Teasing feels light, teasing feels like reaching out for a possible friend.

(Teasing means distracting her mind from all the injuries Kara and Sam might sport once they manage to get them back.

Hopefully only injuries.)

“You know me.” She shrugs, smile imitating Alex’s and the subject is over.

It’s not painful, understanding they have nothing to talk about anymore. Or maybe they have, but this isn’t the moment.

When Alex looks above her shoulder she sees the monitors tuning in on one of Reign’s footage, flying above the city, exuding a power she was yet to see. Her body turns towards it instinctively, eyes softening at the sight of Sam. Not Sam.

_Not Sam_.

“Is there anything I can do?”

Alex doesn’t look at her. She can’t. Because her heart is back in her chest for the first time in what feels like forever, and she feels it rooting its place back, to the same shape it was to begin with. She feels herself going back to being complete, veins connecting, heart pulsing, blood pumping.

She doesn’t need it to hurt again. She can’t make it hurt again. It’s still too soon to confront it, but, maybe, the day is getting closer.

_Just a few chapters indeed_.

“Go home.”

The lightning of the screen of Maggie’s phone draws her attention, eyes settling against it before she can decline the call. She feels her heart pulsing rhythmically, growing stronger by the second, threatening to flee from its place and back to Maggie’s hand.

It doesn’t. Because it calms itself down a minute later.

The understanding that people around her have complex’s lives, much like their own, and they are allowed to just be. Because as much as her life felt like the center of the world, the rock that everyone could lean into, that was just her universe. Everyone had one, just as consuming.

Maggie wasn’t different. Just because she was once part of Alex’s doesn’t mean she doesn’t have her own, where her own people would be part of it as well. Her own friendships, her own family, her own problems, her own job, her own love.

“There’s nothing I can do to change your mind?”

“No.”

She stops, eyes fixed on the face that would haunt a lot of dreams, black mask, black lipstick, black suit. A heart of gold. Reign hoovers above CatCo, fear installed around her, but not for Alex. The only fear she feels is for Sam.

The memories are easy to come back. Ruby. Sam’s hand against her cheek, Sam’s smile at her silly jokes, Sam’s kindness towards her when she wasn’t feeling worthy of any, Sam’s caring when Alex’s wasn’t so lovable.

(Sam’s hands clawing at her back, the feeling of their skin touching, Sam’s moans against her hear, the breathy whimpers, her kisses, her eyes, the way Sam looked at her, Sam’s laughter against her neck every time she forced a curse out of Alex’s mouth.

_Sam_.

Just that simple.)

“I have to get her back.”

(Alex stands close when she’s brought back unconscious into the DEO; she sits on the floor by the cage, and her heart bleeds at the thought of cage, that’s restraining her; she listens to everything Reign says, her threats, her curses, her story; she cries at the thought of Sam being long gone, nothing but Reign in the body she desperately wants to have back; and she holds her hand and doesn’t let go when Sam comes back almost two months later, and Reign is dead.)

 

**And The Sixth, Is When You Admit That You May Have Fucked Up A Little**

_Altschmerz._

_Weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had – the same boring flaws and anxieties that you’ve been gnawing on for years._

**

Over. Seven months of terror ended rather peacefully. It’s actually a very hard idea to wrap her head around, it’s over, Reign is gone and the threats are nothing they couldn’t handle without breaking a sweat.

Reign is gone and there is nothing to worry about, because they are safe. Kara is alright, nothing but a few well placed bruises that healed in a couple of hours, her sister was alive and completely fine, and the energy Alex was spending on keeping her anxiety radiating from her skin had to move somewhere else.

Reign is gone. And so is Sam.

Because Sam needs to heal. Physically she got out of it better than even the most optimistic ones in the team would ever imagine, the powers she developed seeming to numb once more and, therefore, there was no reason to keep her here. There wasn’t a development in her condition and Alex couldn’t keep her locked up.

There was a discussion around the topic, one that ended with Alex’s glare at any suggestion to inflict even the slightest pain on Sam.

Physically, Sam was better than ever. No one but her knew the damage of having a Worldkiller inside her mind, sharing her body, her actions, her intentions.

Alex tries not to think about what Sam told her, about how it felt when Reign took over for good, how it was like seeing things from the driver’s seat but not having the strength to change any of the actions.

Sam is the only one who can carry the burden of what Reign has done, that type of healing took longer, took distance, took hurting too much before getting herself back together. Alex would be the biggest hypocrite if she didn’t let Sam go. Knowing the right course of action didn’t mean it made it hurt any less.

As much as she would love to deny it, it felt like opening up every wound she’s ever had, and it wasn’t enough. It felt like ripping them apart, forcing the cuts deeper and wider, because she didn’t want to lose Sam. Not when she just got her back.

Her legs stop, even when her brain urges her forward, to end this before she hurt too much. Self preservation was never her best.

Sam looks over her shoulder, she whispers something in Ruby’s ear and the teenager barely nods before going inside the car parked in front of Sam’s house. Sam’s old house. The one that stands behind them, which used to be a home and now it was nothing but a congeries of bricks and steel, huddled together.

A house but not a home. Bare walls, empty hallways, the absence of sounds around the house, the proof that the place was lived in, gone. Gone, just like Reign is and how Sam is going to be.

The hold she has on the suitcases loosen up, and she is met with the reality that Sam is actually leaving. That, at the moment, Ruby is inside their car, the moving truck having already left earlier that morning, and Sam stands three steps down, the three steps that lead her to the porch. To staying.

Three steps that mark the end of a year. She is leaving, and, with her, the undertones of a possibility of _them_ , and Alex is not ready to let got.

“I really want to be selfish right now.” Sam steps up, the soft light of National City shines against her hair, a golden aura wrapping around her figure. It only brings a tightening on Alex’s stomach, a pressure she knows all too well. “Ask you to stay.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

A look over her shoulder is all Alex needs. If it’s being too much for Sam, strong, independent Sam, she can’t even begin to imagine what the whole ordeal took on Ruby. If Sam was the one who experienced it, Ruby was sitting on the passenger's seat for the whole drive.

They have a relationship to rebuild, Alex can understand that. Doesn’t mean it hurts any less.

“Rationally, of course I do.”

Sam’s too close, yet, not hers. Hands rest against her shoulders, pulling Alex forward so they’re touching. It’s the closest they got ever since Alex dared to dream she could have her, there’s too much to think, too much to focus.

How Sam’s bare legs are inches from her hands, how Sam’s smile is still the brightest, how Sam’s eyes till seem to see her, much like the very first night, standing in a small balcony and a label of nothing but acquaintances between them.

Compartmentalizing was never a good tact once it came to Samantha Arias. Because Sam had a way of making Alex lose her willpower, her feelings spill and her need crawl up her skin. Compartmentalizing never worked on Alex’s feelings for Sam, because it was something Alex didn’t want to store for later, she wanted to face them. Consequences be damned.

She leans her head down, forehead resting against Sam’s shoulder, face finding shelter against her neck. Alex pulls her closer by the waist, tries to control her breathing, tries to ignore the sinking she feels and knows all too well.

“Feels like I’m scaring you away before we even got a chance to understand.” Her voice sounds hoarse, strange to her ears, even in the low whisper that delivers the words, terrified of showing her emotions too loudly. “The truth is, I fucked up. With Maggie.”

Her grip tightens around Sam’s waist, a way of saying she couldn’t do this, she wouldn’t be able to continue if she had Sam looking at her. Sam lets her, the realization that Sam knows her needs without Alex having to voice them confuses her further. Eventually, she would have to face them. Eventually, because she would have way too much time now that Sam was leaving.

“I did. I rushed things, I asked for too much too fast, and I brought too much of my own shit into our relationship. I fucked up, big time. And I can’t, I just can’t shake the feeling that I did the same with you.”

_With us_.

“Hey, don’t. Look at me.” Her finger are soft, they leave a trail of fire against every single inch they touch until they settle on her cheeks, urging their eyes to meet. She doesn’t mention how her eyes shine, doesn’t mention unwashed tears. Acknowledging them would only make things harder, it would be the understanding that Sam is hurting as much as Alex. That she cares as much as Alex, even though that was something she knew from the beginning, because Sam never hid. “You are allowed to want things. Your needs are valid.”

“No, I-”

“Alex.”

Sam kisses her. Sam kisses her and, suddenly, she isn’t leaving anymore, they aren’t standing in the porch of what used to be the Arias’ residence, they aren’t kissing fifteen feet away from Sam’s daughter, a girl Alex loved with all her heart, even when it wasn’t on her chest.

Sam kisses her, and it feels like things are easier than they are. A Sam Arias’ thing, of course. And it’s long, sweet, lacking the urge of their first kisses, as if they had all the time of the world.

They didn’t.

When Sam rests their foreheads together, she sees the tears, it’s one of those things she quite doesn’t understand fully, but feels right. There’s no need to question it.

“It’s not your fault. There are divergences we cannot ignore and they are enough to end something good. And learn and grow from there. And it’s okay if you fucked up, because it’s what we do, we fuck things up. But we do better next time.”

Alex presses their lips together, it’s way faster this time, when Sam stars pulling away, putting distance between them. Physically forcing herself away before she gave too much of herself and turning back felt impossible. Alex definitely felt that.

Alex felt like losing herself, like giving herself up all over again. Like jumping of a cliff before knowing what was below the edge. Water or ground. She understands, then, the necessity of leaving, of looking over what was waiting for them before going forward, before leaping.

One foot. Sam stands one foot out of her reach, a sad smile on her lips and visible tear streams on both sides of her face.

“About us? I think we still have to heal, even if it’s easier with someone along the way. There are some parts of ourselves we have to mend on our own, and we can’t let other people do that for us before we can fully move forward, to what we want but cannot have at the moment. Otherwise, how can we learn?”

Feels like delaying the inevitable. Alex is okay with that. Still, her insecurities get the best of her, and the words leave her mouth in a barely audible whisper but Sam catches. Alex is sure, then, that Sam would always be there to catch her.

“Was I just a chapter?”

“You are my whole damn book, Alex.” Her smile grows, she takes the suitcase Alex carried outside. “I’ll see you around, Danvers.”

The words sting, they do because they hit too close to home, because they were the final stop of what she had built before. Maybe it’s just the confirmation Alex needed to understand she still had some work to do on herself, after all.

Maybe the day she is able to move on completely is way closer than she thinks.

“I’ll see you, Arias.” Not a goodbye, but it surely feels like one.

She leaves. Sam leaves and Alex forces her heart to stay rooted in its place, to stop its endless pursuit for things she could not have at the moment.

She goes to Kara, because there’s no one else in the entire world she ought to share everything with. She goes to Kara because she is spilling and, now, seeing things clearly, she feels foolish for not going earlier, for not relying on her sister as much as she should’ve.

And Kara listens, like she always does. And hugs her when her voice cracks at the first mention of Sam. And holds her when she eventually breaks, the weight of losing, not only Maggie all those months back, but also Winn, Ruby, Sam.

She goes to Kara, because Kara is her sister and the healing she has to do by herself starts with rebuilding the relationship she neglected the past couple of years.

Recovery is a bitch. A necessary one, but a bitch nevertheless.

 

**Seventh? You Learn To Move On**

 

_Jouska._

_A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head._

**

It takes Alex one hour twenty-three minutes and seventeen seconds to finally let go and she feels her last scar molding back into unmarked skin. She feels the skin of her chest smooth, no bump or trepidation.

No scars. She is complete.

_There are some parts of ourselves we have to mend on our own_. And she stands tall in front of the ocean, watching as the waves rhythmically crashed against the shore before being pulled back, each time taking the ring further and further away from Alex.

Free. She is finally free. Not from the memories, no, those were carefully locked away in a part of her brain and of her heart she had reserved especially for that. To remember and to feel, to smile at what she had gone through and to look back at it and be able to say she grew from the experience. She is free, from the pain and hurt she carried for so long, the end of a cycle and the beginning of a new one.

To appreciate what she had gone through and to thank for the lesson her older self needed, but to understand her present self didn’t. It’s letting go from everything, but keeping a souvenir from the ride, as a reminder, to cherish and care for.

Her souvenir were the memories. They were something impossible to let go, because they were happy, they played an important role on molding her into the woman she was today. The woman who knew what she wanted and how to get it and was not going to let go this time, because it could work. It should work.

She spends the three-hour drive back to her apartment reliving. And it doesn’t hurt. Her heart is beating peacefully on her chest, a quiet reminder that it’s over and she turned out okay, as the past moments come and go.

Their shared Valentine’s Day, as they danced, foreheads touching, and the love that spread through her chest, the realization that this could be it. The shared morning afters, all of the awkwardness giving space to stolen kisses and playful banter. The words they shared in red anger and the differences in viewing the world, things they could not ignore and that pulled them further and further away from each other until they were already too far gone.

Everything. Alex found out she was glad for everything.

With a smile, calmness washing through her, Alex takes off her helmet, leaves it at the bike’s compartment, and heads towards the entrance of her building. The door closing behind her feels like the metaphorical ending to the real one.

It’s not until she is inside the elevator, red number changing as she goes up, hands fidgeting with her unlocked cellphone, that reality finally crashes with her.

Reality being, she knows what she wanted, for months now she did, and she got to that point after too long. She was ready. What she wanted, though, didn’t depend only on herself and her ability to heal.

_Sam_. A thought that hasn’t left her mind ever since the last kiss they shared, sunlight lighting her eyes, black spots blurring her vision, or maybe the thought hasn’t left her mind since the moment Sam kissed her, hushed and sweet. _Sam_ , and the never-ending possibilities they have once they are both on the same page. _Sam_ , and the dark limbo she was left in when she left, not a single second of communication since then, apart from sporadic texts with Ruby, knowing that there would be a someday and not knowing when.

Alex’s fingers hoover over her contact info and she knows that if she had a single drop of alcohol at the moment, she would’ve called without a second of hesitation. The need to hear her voice was something that had happened too many times already, and always left Alex with a bad taste on her mouth once she decided against it.

Space. Sam had asked for nothing but space to pull herself back into something that resembled the Sam before everything happened and Alex had to give it to her. So she waited for Sam to reach out, and hoped that one day she would.

Sam never did.

The doors of the elevator are already closing when she snaps out of it, rushing out before she is led to a floor that isn’t hers, tucking the phone into her pocket. She freezes, she freezes standing a handful of yards away from her apartment because Sam stands in front of her door, fist raised in the air.

Sam is more beautiful than ever, or as beautiful as ever and Alex was letting the time speak louder than ever before, to allow herself the longing she tried so hard to convince she was not feeling. Sam is as beautiful as ever.

The tips of her hair barely touching her shoulder, her profile accentuating the definition of her jaw and Alex can’t help but stare. She can’t remember how to breathe, the beauty standing in front of her taking all of her focus and Alex would gladly die from it.

Four months. It’s been four months without contact, no call, no text, only memories in the late nights as she laid down on a bed deemed too big for one and sleep came in waves, crashing then retreating.

Minutes of peace succumbing to restless awaking. Sam on her mind. Sam always there.

Four months and the first thing Alex wants to do is touch her, to make sure the feeling she committed to memory makes justice to how it actually is. She doesn’t think so. Because touching Sam is a different experience each time, it races Alex’s heart into a different tune every time it happens.

But Sam brings her fist down, shakes her head and turn around, arms crossing in front of her chest. She sees her. They see each other and the words Alex practiced over and over on her head, the way she always thought their conversation would go once they were finally at the same place again, are gone.

The conversation she ached for so long to have and the one she had planned and rehearsed gets lost, because Sam is here and no amount of time could’ve prepared Alex for it.

“Were you leaving without even saying ‘hey’?”

Sam laughs, Alex laughs with her, and the tension she hadn’t even noticed dissipates. They get closer, not touching, because Alex is afraid that once she starts she won’t be able to stop.

Unfortunately, before anything happens, there are words that need to be shared. Four months worthy of words.

“When did you get here? How did, I mean, how long are you staying?”

“This morning. Lena picked me and Ruby up from the airport and she insisted on letting us stay at hers until our apartment is free to moving in.” Her fingers come up, brush a wild strand of hair from out of her face and to the back of her ear, a burning growing in Alex’s hand from knowing she wanted to be the one responsible for doing that. “She’s also staying with Ruby tonight so I could come get some, her words not mine.”

Mischief shine in her eyes, the hairs in the back of Alex’s neck rising at the promise, at the bluntness of the statement. Not that it made it any less real. It was inevitable.

“Come get some means never knocking?”

“I had a whole speech planned, in which I would confess everything, but you’re here and… I was scared.” Sam admits in a whisper and the atmosphere around them becomes charged with the soft admission in three words.

Vulnerability, a concept Alex was very unaware of for too long and now was a routine when it came to Sam.

“Of what?” Her tone matches it, a low exhale in an even lower voice, afraid of breaking the shared confession they were getting into.

Sam’s hand rests against her chest, their eyes meet, a long gaze in which no words were needed because Alex understands. They understand. But Sam continues and her voice breaks, but the words are out and a choice is to be made.

“That even after so long I still feel too much for you. That I want you but it’d be too late."

It’s enough for now.

Alex kisses her, hard and numbing, way different than all the kisses they had already shared, because this one conveys months of pent up emotion Alex was never able to keep from Sam. This one, a couple of minutes long, is made to pour every single emotion she had on the months when Sam was all that went through her head.

Alex kisses her, and Sam’s mouth opens for her, as if she had been waiting for it since she stepped into the building. Their tongues meet and Alex feels strong and weak all together, a feeling she could only describe as Sam Arias. None of the simulations comes close to how it turns out, not even in the most optimistic ones.

They kiss and it’s electric, heart racing, toes curling, breath taking, everything Alex knew that was entirely attached to Sam. And they still had a lot to talk about, but it could wait until later.

Way later.

Because Sam’s hands were already under her shirt, resting against the skin of her hipbones, drawing small circles in it, and Alex was painfully aware of the growing slickness between her legs, the tightening in her chest that Sam is back for good, that Sam wants her.

When she comes back for air, the smile she is met with is bright, lovely, and it makes her want to rip her heart out and hand it to Sam. But she grew and learned that she didn’t have to do that for Sam to know Alex was hers. Completely.

Her thumb brushed against Sam’s lips, still not believing she was here, even after being able to kiss her, to hold her.

“I loved the hair, by the way. Very hot.”

Alex laughs, runs her fingers through the length of it, still unused to the feeling of the shorter parts.

“I have to say the same. But you mentioned that you are free for the night?” A nod is all she gets before she kisses Sam’s cheek, lips dragging until they press against the shell of her ear, she smirks at the gasp it elicits. “Wanna go to my place?”

They don’t talk, they don’t need to. Because they have time.

_Time_.

She wakes up in the middle of the night to an empty cold bed, crumpled sheets and the absence of clothing, every piece that she finds thrown in a path leading to her bed, the only indications that it wasn’t just a dream. That Sam is back. To stay.

Her window is still closed, no light coming from the outside, too deep into dawn to shed any light through the glass. It’s were she finds Sam, sitting in her naked glory at a chair probably dragged from the dining table, eyes fixed on the night ahead of her, the quietness provided by the lack of threats, something she never thought she would find strange.

She doesn’t have to think twice before going to Sam, crouching down in front of her, taking the hands resting on her lap into her own. Offering comfort, a thing Sam was more than willing to receive.

“Come back to bed.” She whispers, _c_ _ome back to me_.

Even in the dark she sees her smile, because it’s Sam and it didn’t matter how far they were, how dark it was, Alex would always see her. It’s Sam, it’s enough of an explanation.

“I remember everything.” She doesn’t need to clarify, because it is the one topic they would never talk about in daylight, something too painful to taint the beautiful light they shared and something way easier to say when they didn’t have to look at each other. “I can’t sleep.”

“I’ll stay with you.”

Sam nods and allows herself to be pulled up from the chair, allows herself to be kissed and led to bed, allows herself to be dragged under sheets and tucked under Alex’s chin.

They fit, easily even. Sam holds her tight, close, every inch of uncovered skin touching as if she is afraid this could end, that this isn’t real. They aren’t real. She breathes raggedly until Alex reaches out, lets her fingers graze against the expanse of her back, goosebumps erupting with each passing second.

They fit, and Sam calms down. Sam allows herself to be loved, to be cared for, physically matching the feeling inside, melting against Alex’s touch.

Alex lets go of a breath she wasn’t even aware she was holding, leaves a kiss on her temple. Sam feels like coming home.

_A whole damn book, indeed_.

**Author's Note:**

> Now I'm gonna go cry at the corner because I want Sam back
> 
> you can find me on Tumblr/Twitter as: @BroodyJC


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